


Hip to Be Square

by seutedeern



Category: X-Men (Movies), X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014) - Fandom, X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - 1980s, Alternate Universe - High School, Alternate Universe - Still Have Powers, Charles Is a Big Dorkface, Charles Xavier has a Ph.D in Adorable, Erik is not a Happy Bunny, Human Charles, M/M, Poor Charles, Protective Erik
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-01-07
Updated: 2015-01-15
Packaged: 2018-03-06 13:11:34
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 12,309
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3135695
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/seutedeern/pseuds/seutedeern
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The year is 1985. Humans and mutants have lived together for a hundred years and now co-exist peacefully. </p><p>That is, outside of high school. Charles Xavier happens to be an ordinary human being, but that's not the worst of his troubles. He's a true geek, with so few friends he could count them on two fingers, and he also happens to be the school's favourite victim.</p><p>Erik has always looked down upon humans without any powers, thinking he is superior to them.</p><p>Naturally, he's not pleased at all when for some unknown reason, Charles latches onto him after only one lesson of group work as though they were the best of friends.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Right, so I may or may have not an unhealthy love for _Starter for 10_ , which inspired this fic. James's performance as an awkward geek has always stuck with me, and so I wrote this thing to satisfy my own cravings for nerdy little Charles at high school.
> 
> (That craving was only enhanced by clips of James's role in _White Teeth_.)
> 
> Thanks a lot to my dear [Obstinatrix](http://archiveofourown.org/users/Obstinatrix/pseuds/Obstinatrix) who beta-ed the fic for me. ♥

It was no secret in modern human society that mutants were among us; had been there for thousands of years, in fact. Of course it had been complicated at first when they emerged from every corner of the world in 1885, slowly showing themselves and what they were capable of. Ordinary humans had understandable difficulties getting used to the idea that there were some who were superior to them. Almost a century later, though, society had come so far that mutants and normal humans were living side by side peacefully. People grew up together, people worked together, people shared the planet.

While at first some human parents had been wary of letting their children play with mutant children, they adjusted to it rather quickly -- especially the children, who enjoyed being with their mutant friends on the playgrounds and exploring their abilities. These days, humans and mutants were no longer segregated in the education system, and all schools gave children the opportunity to explore whatever gifts their mutations had given them. 

Erik was eleven years old when a test confirmed his suspicions that he could control metal. It had started to worry him that sometimes the little lamp on his bed side table would be crumpled into a metal ball on some mornings after he had woken up from some nightmare. Neither of his parents was a mutant, after all, so at first little Erik had thought his mind had been playing tricks on him.

Of course, being mutant catapulted Erik right into the _cool kids club_ \-- human children asked him to shape things for them during their lunch breaks, and he could talk with other mutants about his progress in developing his abilities. It didn’t take him long to train his sense of metal, such that by the age of sixteen, he could feel the tiniest movement of pens scraping over paper in his classroom, if he really wanted. Iron was singing to him in the blood of his classmates, aching underneath the weight of each individual that sat down on a chair or decided to lie sprawled across the desk, and keeping him grounded in moments when he thought he was going mad when the pace of a lesson happened to be sluggishly slow.

One thing that fascinated Erik were visible mutations. Of course _all_ mutations were good, Erik tended to feel that all mutants were _superior_ to normal humans, but visible mutations were something else entirely. He loved watching other mutant teenagers showing off their wings or tails, or that one Xavier kid who could shift her shape effortlessly into anybody she wanted to be. More than once he had contemplated asking her to turn into the headmaster just so she could tell the entire school that they were granted a day off. Raven Xavier, however, was several years beneath him and she always looked a bit intimidated by Erik whenever he smiled at her. Unlike her brother, her _human_ brother, Charles, who was a right pain in the ass.

He had never quite figured out why this lanky boy in his oversized sweaters and hideous aviator glasses had started to follow him around school half a year ago. Maybe it was because they had been forced to be partners on a group project _once_ when Charles’s equally geeky friend Hank -- who was just as uncool as Charles despite his visible mutation, which Charles’s level of uncoolness instantly balanced out, throwing Hank right back into the nerdy geek pit of doom -- had been sick. Erik didn’t know why but for some reason the absurd idea that Erik was Charles’s friend had somehow become ingrained in Xavier’s brain, which led to Charles creepily hanging around within Erik’s vicinity, thinking he was _safe_.

At least Charles had the decency not to bother him when Erik’s other friends -- his _actual_ friends were around. Although…

“Erik, he’s staring at me. _Again_.”

“I’m sure you’re just imagining things, Emma.”

“No, I’m not, you asshole. I can _feel_ his stare burning into my forehead.” She frowned deeply at her food, pointedly not looking up. “I don’t get why you don’t tell that little creeper to fuck off once and for all.”

Emma was probably Erik’s best friend, as well as a casual fling whenever they were bored and in the mood for some action. She wasn’t his girlfriend per se but he didn’t mind treating her as such. Nor did Erik really mind that Emma was a mutant as well. He even found it thrilling when she sent inappropriate but nonetheless deliciously lewd thoughts towards him in class from time to time with her telepathy. While telepaths were widely regarded as the weirdos among mutants -- nobody really trusted them out of fear of being manipulated or having their deepest, dirtiest secrets unearthed -- Erik saw no threat in them. At least not when it came to Emma. She helped him cheat during class tests, after all.

“Why don’t you do it yourself if he annoys you that much?” he asked, taking a sip from his drink.

“If I talk to him, I might catch something. Like bad skin or a piss poor fashion sense. Soon I’d start wearing scratchy self-knit sweaters from my grandmother.”

That was another thing Erik liked about Emma -- she was one of the most outspoken people he had ever met.

“Well, you could always mentally strongly suggest that he should leave us alone.”

“Thank you, Erik, what would I do without your brilliant ideas?” She rolled her eyes. “It’s not as if I haven’t tried before to manipulate him into jumping from the nearest bridge.”

“But what?”

“It didn’t work. I can’t really enter his mind. Not completely.” Listlessly, she shoved a potato across her plate with her fork. “Maybe his brain is broken.”

“That would explain a lot,” Erik sighed. He leaned forward, resting his arms on the table, and discreetly turned his head to shoot a glance at Charles’s direction. When he caught sight of him, the boy flinched and quickly looked down at the book in front of him. So he had been staring indeed. Erik shuddered.

It was a shame, really, that Charles was sort of what stood between him and Raven. If it wasn’t for him, he’d have talked to her and about her mutation long ago but, as Erik had to find out the hard way, he couldn’t talk to her without her annoying human brother hovering around immediately like a butterfly. Or a moth. What made things even worse was the fact that he and Charles were desk partners in their upcoming Chemistry lesson.

Charles was already sitting at their shared table, back hunched over some notes he was frantically scribbling down before the class started -- presumably, someone else’s homework -- and when Erik unceremoniously put down his bag on the table, Charles nearly jumped at the sound.

“Hi, Erik.” Charles smiled brightly at him as he pushed up his awful large wire-framed glasses with his finger, his cheeks a bright rosy colour, his friendliness unwavering as ever. Which was another thing that annoyed Erik -- Charles was always so fucking _happy_ and _friendly_ to everyone. If people treated Erik the way they treated the Annoying Xavier Sibling, he would have been suspended from school long ago.

“Hey,” he grunted as he sat down, hoping that this would be enough conversation for today.

“Do you want to compare homework before Mrs. Fisher comes in?” Charles asked, already taking out his own homework while the person whose work he'd been correcting snatched her exercise book hastily away.

“I’m good,” Erik hastily responded before Charles could get the idea Erik _wanted_ to talk to him. Thankfully, the teacher came into the classroom just in time and told them that they’d be experimenting today. Charles looked a little disappointed but he shrugged it off just as quickly, and together, he and Erik had the best lab results of the day.

When the lesson was over at last, Charles fidgeted next to Erik. He wasn’t as fast with packing up his things as Erik was, seemed even a little reluctant to do so while Erik couldn’t get out of here quickly enough.

“Erik, can I ask you something?” Charles eventually said as he zipped up his jacket. He seemed a little nervous. Erik looked anywhere but at Charles.

“What?”

“I, uhm, well, it’s my birthday tomorrow and I --”

“Don’t talk to him for too long, Erik, he _smells_ weird!” some boy said who passed them by, giving Erik’s shoulder a squeeze while he laughed. Charles had fallen silent, face flushed.

When Erik noticed the look on the other’s face, his grin died instantly on his lips and he cleared his throat. “What did you say?”

Charles blinked owlishly at him for a moment, and then -- “Never mind.” Faster than Erik had ever witnessed, Charles packed his things and crammed them into his backpack.

“Charles,” Erik sighed, and when Charles ignored him, he repeated himself more resolutely, “ _Charles_ , for fuck’s sake, what did you want to say?”

“Nothing.” Charles gave him a strained smile. His glasses slipped down his nose, too big for his face, and he pushed them up again. “I’m sorry, I didn’t want to embarrass you or anything.” He hitched up his backpack. “It was a stupid idea, really.”

“Jesus, I’m not going to ask you again what you wanted to say, so this is the last time.”

“All right, all right.” Charles practically withered into obedience before Erik’s eyes. “It’s just… It’s my birthday tomorrow, and I wanted to invite you, s’all…” He wasn’t looking at him while he spoke, probably didn’t have the nerve for it, and Erik felt slightly sorry for him. Knowing more or less how socially accepted Charles was at this school, he could imagine how many friends he probably had to celebrate with. “As I said, forget about it.”

God, why couldn’t Erik shut his damn mouth for _once_ in his life? Why did he have to get himself into a situation that would practically be social suicide?

“It’s okay,” he ground out reluctantly through clenched teeth, the syllables coming out nearly unintelligible.

Charles cocked his head a little and furrowed his eyebrows with narrowed eyes as he tried to understand what Erik was mumbling.

“Sorry?”

“I said it’s _okay_ ,” he repeated and muttered an additional “Jesus,” under his breath.

“So,” Charles drew out the word in the most overly annoying way possible, “Is that a yes?”

At least the classroom had been entirely vacated by this point, so it was really just them in here (even Mrs. Fisher had retreated back into the storeroom for the chemicals), and Erik felt secure enough as he said (despite the words burning like acid on his tongue), “All right. Okay. I’ll be there.”

As soon as the words had left his mouth, he might have cursed himself but Charles… Charles was fucking _beaming_ at him, eyes going wide, lips stretched into a comical ‘o’ while his tiny bird brain processed Erik’s answer. And then he was grinning at him, easily competing with the sun outside that shone with evil joy down upon Erik’s misfortune. But even he, Erik Lehnsherr, a second generation German immigrant whose mother still struggled with her accent after all these years, mutant and proud and _superior_ to normal useless human beings -- even he didn’t have a heart of stone. Some sick self-loathing part of him felt sorry for the boy in front of him who seemed to get picked on by the entire school. Charles had only two friends, as far as Erik could tell, Hank and Raven. One’s own sister didn’t really count, however, so Charles really had just one friend who was sick most of the time.

Erik didn’t want to be Charles’s friend, not even if someone threatened to tie him up and shave his hair off, but he couldn’t really look away from this train wreck of a birthday party either.

 _You fucking did not do that, Erik. Please tell me it was just some warped messed up worst-case scenario that I had seen in your brain or whatever you want to call that slab of meat instead of what actually happened,_ Emma’s voice berated him angrily in his mind as he walked down the corridor.

He heaved a sigh.

 _I heard that, too, you know,_ Emma clicked her tongue mentally at him.

_Piss off, Em._

_What in all that is holy possessed you to say ‘yes’ to that little nerd? Are you mental? Did someone blackmail you into this? I know a guy who could help you with that, and take care of Charles as well while he’s at it…_

_Will you shut up?_ he groaned out loud. Other people around Erik were shooting worried glances at him. _We’ll talk when school is over, okay?_

 _Fine_ , she huffed out, voice testy. _I’m curious about what poor explanation you’ll come up with._

_I don’t even know why I have to justify this to you._

_Because you hate him as much as I do, sugar._


	2. Chapter 2

News usually tended to travel fast at their high school, but there were only three people who knew Erik would be going to Charles’s birthday party, and none of them would breathe a word to anyone. Emma wouldn’t do it because as much as she loved gossiping, she wouldn’t betray Erik’s trust in her. Also, he’d have her head in an instant if she told anyone else about his imminent social suicide. With Emma out of the potential danger zone, this only left Charles and Erik (and perhaps Charles’s much cooler but alas much younger mutant sister Raven) in the Circle of Knowledge.

Erik would be stupid if he said anything.

And Charles would be asking for violence if he attempted to tell anyone.

Much to Erik’s relief, however, Charles didn’t seem inclined to brag about the fact that _Erik Lehnsherr_ was going to grace him with his presence. In fact, it seemed as though Charles hadn’t told _anybody_ that it was his birthday because nobody bothered to congratulate him in the first place. They had their first class together and before it started, Charles had set up a bowl with sweets for everyone. It was a tradition that every pupil brought sweets or cake to school when it was their birthday, and now Charles had done just that and -- and while the majority of their fellow classmates reached into the bowl and grabbed some candy bars, nobody knew where they came from. Some looked around in confusion, others just shrugged and took two more pieces than would have been socially acceptable. And Charles… Erik felt something in his gut twist at the way Charles looked. His cheeks were pink with excitement. He kept his eyes trained on everyone, ready to accept birthday wishes. And yet, none came.

When almost the entire class had devoured Charles’s treats, he looked downright crestfallen. Of course nobody remembered him. Charles was only human, and even then he was apparently a human of the kind nobody bothered to socialise with. Erik knew how it was to feel isolated from the people around him, but he could only imagine what Charles must have been feeling at this very moment.

It wasn’t as if he was an unjust person. Erik hated it when people treated their peers with disrespect. He rejected any sort of inhuman behaviour, and some tiny part of him niggled at him to stand up and be at least _one_ person to wish Charles a happy birthday -- after all, nobody deserved to be treated that way on their own birthday. Not even geeky Charles (who didn’t smell weird in the slightest -- Erik had checked) who was nothing but kind to his rude classmates. But Erik would be damned if anybody saw him talking to the Xavier kid as if it was normal. They both were in totally different social circles after all.

When the lesson was over, Charles quietly walked over to the desk where he had set up the treats and put what was left back into his bag. He didn’t look at anybody and nobody seemed to mind him. Charles was invisible to the world. Except that he wasn’t invisible to Erik, not anymore.

Taking a deep breath, he walked over to him and came to stand by his side. “Let me help you with this,” he said quietly, his hands seemingly working of their own accord as they gathered Charles’s belongings.

“You don’t have to do this, Erik,” Charles replied. His voice sounded neutral enough to keep up the illusion he wasn’t affected in the slightest by his classmates’ indifference.

“Shut up and let me help.”

Charles obliged and held open his bag while Erik carefully placed some dishes on top of the bowl. Charles was frowning at the bag in his hands. His glasses slipped. He pushed them up again with a small, frustrated sigh.

“See you later, then,” Erik announced, his voice as noncommittal and bland as possible. But he didn’t fail to notice how Charles’s eyes went ridiculously wide at this and...well, Erik would be lying through his teeth if he said he didn’t feel a little smug about it. He’d be an even worse liar if he thought he could get away with telling himself that there was something oddly satisfying about seeing Charles smile at him, slow and shy as it was.

Whilst deliberately ignoring the weird warm feeling that spread from his chest right throughout his body, he marched out of the classroom, hoping he was making a point by doing so.

*

Later that day, the time had come for him to get out of Westchester’s shopping mall (not that he'd been putting too much thought into Charles's present, or anything) and go straight to where Charles and his much, much, _much_ cooler sister Raven lived. He knew it was somewhere in the outskirts, where buses ran only every half an hour, but he didn’t mind. At least that way, he was granted enough time to prepare himself mentally for the oncoming party while his walkman played away the latest tape he had made himself -- with Huey Lewis and the News currently playing. _Back to the Future_ was his new favourite film ever since he had watched it the weekend before with Emma, who had rolled her eyes every two seconds at the word _flux capacitor_. Erik had a feeling that she had only come along because of teenage heartthrob Michael J. Fox.

While not everyone at school bothered to recognise Charles as an actual human being, it was a well-known fact that the Xaviers were rich. Or rather, so loaded that it was considered almost offensive, if not downright rude.

The mansion itself looked rather intimidating as Erik walked up the long drive, Queen blasting out on his walkman now, and it didn’t get any better when he rang the doorbell and had to wait several minutes until someone opened the door.

“May I help you?” A middle aged man with salt and pepper hair greeted him, his entire posture stiff and straight, both looking and sounding as though he had just escaped Buckingham Palace.

“I, uh.” Erik scratched his neck, looking around nervously in case, perhaps, he had gone to the wrong address. “Is Charles there?”

The butler, whose name was probably James, Alfred or something else appropriately butler-y, eyed him suspiciously for a long uncomfortable moment before his face broke out into a grin and he shrunk beneath Erik’s size into the shape of a lovely blue red-haired girl.

“What are you waiting for? Charles’s been running around like a headless chicken for half an hour now because he wants this to be _perfect_.” Raven sighed deeply with an exaggerated roll of her yellow eyes as she stepped aside to let Erik in. Maybe if he befriended Charles, he could date -- “He’s in the living room, in case you’re wondering. Our mother’s not home, so don’t worry.” She interrupted Erik’s train of thought with another sweet but slightly wicked smile. She led him through half the mansion, and Erik was sure that the Xavier siblings’ ancestors were scrutinising him thoroughly as well as judging him from their portraits, and when they finally entered the living room, he was greeted by the sight of a nervous Charles circling around the table in front of the TV, pushing bowls of chips back and forth until he was satisfied with the result.

Apart from the building’s size, the other unsettling thing was that -- well, there was only Hank sitting on the couch next to the TV. It was just the four of them, then. Charles’s only friend, his sister, and Erik, who somehow had been manipulated into attending this disaster of a birthday party.

“Erik!” Charles’s entire face lit up with delight nonetheless once he noticed his last guest had finally arrived. He came over to him quickly, looking ever so excited, and gave him the biggest grin he could muster. “I’m so glad you could make it.”

“Charles was already worried you wouldn’t come,” Raven teased, which earned her a frown and an affronted, “Pfft, _no_?” from her brother.

“Well, here I am,” Erik said and unceremoniously shoved his little gift box against Charles’s chest. Charles looked at him as though he had just handed him the Holy Grail. “What?” Erik asked, feeling a little less confident with each second that passed in silence while Charles stared at the gift.

“You got me something?”

“Well, yeah. It’s your birthday, isn’t it?”

“Yes, but…”

“But what?”

“You didn’t have to, you know…”

As filthy rich as Charles’s family was, Erik began to wonder to what extent Charles’s social interactions were nonexistent. What sort of mother left her son alone on his birthday, after all? Only just now, Erik noticed how this room felt absolutely cold. There weren't any birthday decorations, except for some balloons Charles and Raven had put up, and neither did Erik spot anything resembling the usual little pile of birthday presents. Of course, they could have been in Charles’s room already, but Erik had a feeling that this wasn’t the case.

“What else did you get for your birthday?” he found himself blurting out before he could shut himself up. Charles, however, didn’t seem to mind that question. He immediately darted off and walked over to a shelf where he carefully took out a large box.

When he came back, he held it up, smiling proudly at Erik.

“Raven gave me this. It’s a microscope. I’ve always wanted one.”

“For someone who can only dissect onions, you sure get excited about it,” Raven remarked dryly but Erik noticed a faint proud blush on her round cheeks nevertheless. She was secretly pleased that Charles liked her gift so much.

“Nice,” Erik said as he read what was written all over the box. And for once, he was genuine about it. While Erik didn’t _seem_ particularly interested in science, he secretly gloated over being the best in his Physics class. He was third best when it came to Biology and Chemistry -- Hank was second in those fields and Charles, quite predictably with how clever this tiny little person actually was, came first.

Charles took the box back from Erik, cradled it against his chest like a baby, and Erik followed Raven over to the sofa where Hank was watching him warily. In their five years of being together at the same school, Erik and Hank had exchanged approximately zero words. _Hey_ was to be the first. Neither did he fail to notice a grey rectangle-shaped box standing on the ground in front of the TV. Erik gaped.

“Is that a NES?” he asked, disbelief evident in his voice as he knelt down in front of it, one hand reaching out hesitantly.

“Uhm, yeah,” Charles laughed behind him, embarrassed.

“How did you get one? They won’t be out here for another four months or so!”

“Connections,” Charles replied with pursed lips. He looked visibly uncomfortable talking about this so Erik decided to let the topic drop. He wouldn’t leave this house, though, without having tested the latest gaming console at least once.

“I’d ask you to test it with us now,” Charles then said, now smiling at him again, sweet and genuine, “But I’m afraid it’ll have to wait for a while.”

“Why?”

“Live Aid,” Hank replied while he adjusted his glasses.

“Charles is _crazy_ about Queen.”

“Are they on?”

“Yes, just like his crush on Freddie Martian.”

“It’s Mercury, Raven. _Mercury_. How often do I have to tell you that?” Charles clicked his tongue dismissively. Only too late he noticed that his sister was joking, and then he coughed out with red cheeks. “Well, either way, I’d like to watch their concert, if that’s all right with you.”

He couldn’t believe it. Charles was, despite his geeky behaviour and weird old-man clothes -- Erik hated to even think it, but there was no help for it -- he was _cool_. Charles liked video games, even possessed the latest gaming consoles on the market through some seedy semi-legal connection, and even his taste in music seemed to be fine as well. Perhaps this was just Emma weaving an insane illusion of an alternate reality in his brain; one in which Charles was actually bearable and not at all the way people at school preferred to paint him.

“I recorded the concert, in case you were wondering,” Charles offered meekly.

“Huh?”

“School,” he clarified for Erik who felt as though he hadn’t quite caught up with what Charles was talking about. His brain was still frozen by the discovery of Charles’s unexpected level of coolness. “I couldn’t watch it over the weekend because I had to study for our class test.”

“Oh. That makes sense,” Erik found himself replying dumbly.

Charles in the meantime shot him a wary look. “You _do_ like Queen, don’t you? If not, we can do something else. I’m not going to force --”

“Charles. It’s your _birthday_. Why wouldn’t we be doing what you want to do? And, besides, who does _not_ like Queen?” Before Erik knew it, he had worked himself into an indignant frenzy of annoyance and offence -- annoyed because even within his own four walls Charles was just too fucking considerate and worried about upsetting someone; offended because Charles had just suggested that he wasn’t into one of the greatest bands ever to grace this planet. Maybe _the_ greatest band, right up on the same pedestal with The Beatles.

“So you don’t mind?”

Raven let out a groan right behind him. “Jesus Christ, Charles, get a grip. He just said it’s fine. Put on the damn tape before _I_ pick something. And none of you likes _Flashdance_ , or do you?”

All three boys shuddered visibly at that.

Seeing Freddie strut across the stage was much more satisfying. Sooner rather than later, Erik found himself singing along to all the songs once Charles had started with it. _Bohemian Rhapsody_ had the magical power to bring people together, regardless of whether they liked each other or not.

Once the concert had ended, it was more than pleasing to see that both Brian May and Freddie Mercury went back on stage to perform once more some time during the evening. Charles was grinning from ear to ear -- perhaps this was the best birthday gift he could have received on this day.

Which lead Erik’s thoughts back to his own present for Charles. He cringed hard when he remembered what he had given him. Charles still had yet to open it; maybe if he was very subtle about it, he could take it back without the birthday boy noticing it, maybe --

“Oh, I almost forgot!” And of course this was the moment Charles remembered the gift, as though he had just read Erik’s mind. Stupid human being.

Charles picked up the present, fingertips lightly grazing along the edge of it, while he looked up at Erik with a nervous little smile. “May I? Or shall I open it later?”

Erik grunted out a vague reply, emphasized by a shrug.

It really was no surprise to him that Charles was careful and meticulous when it came to unwrapping a present, but the time Charles took to open it was beyond ridiculous. Erik found himself half wanting to snap at him just to fucking rip it open, half considering whether he should let a pair of scissors float through the room and cut it open himself. Once he was done, though, there was a moment of silence during which Erik felt his heart sink.

_Oh, God, I fucked up. He hates it. Who even gives someone a book about evolution? I should have listened to Emma and got him a voucher for new clothes instead, I --_

“Oh, Erik. I don’t know what to say,” Charles said, and when Erik chanced a look at the other’s face, he found him smiling. “Thank you, my friend. How did you know I was into genetics?”

_Yes, how?_

“Well, you always go on about it during our Biology lessons, so…”

“You remembered? I didn’t think you would.”

“As I said, you _always_ talk about it…”

“Well,” Hank’s usually shy voice suddenly piped up, sounding frightfully confident and matter-of-fact. “If we’re being precise, Charles has mentioned it only twice so far. Last Biology lesson, which we had just this morning, and then last week.”

Raven laughed out loud, and Erik briefly wondered if he should use the metal in Hank’s watch to throttle him.

“At any rate,” Charles coughed out, trying hard to bite back a grin, “I love it. I’m going to read it as soon as I can.”

Erik nearly breathed out a snide _nerd_ but he held his tongue. Not because he didn’t want to offend Charles but because Charles had taken off his glasses to rub at his tired eyes. And Erik was shocked into silence.

Charles was actually quite handsome without these hideous things on his nose that blocked, no, _ruined_ the sight of his face.

It was odd, to catch a glimpse like this of how good Charles could look, but the moment passed quickly enough. He put his glasses back on and then he looked again like his old nerdy self, body too slim to fit into his clothes and as though he had yet to grow into his own skin.

“I don’t know about you, but I’m starving,” was what he said next, and so the afternoon went by, turned into evening, and Erik didn’t even notice he had genuinely enjoyed himself until it was time for him to go back home.

Huh.


	3. Chapter 3

“So, you and the geeky Xavier hung out together?”

“Since you already know the answer, why do you bother asking anyway?”

“Just to piss you off, darling,” Emma smirked as she took out her history book after they had sat down at their tables in the classroom. “If I hadn’t seen it in your memories, Erik, believe me, I would have thought this was some really, really, really bad joke someone had made about you.”

“Well, it’s not. Now will you shut up about it?”

“I just --” Her gaze briefly flickered to the entrance door through which their teacher was just approaching. She lowered her voice, turning it into a sibilant hiss. “I still don’t understand why you’d commit social suicide like that. You don’t even _like_ him.”

“He’s not _that bad_ , Em,” Erik found himself replying testily before he could shut himself up. The look he received in return had his cheeks colouring faintly. She was doing -- she was actually smiling at him. It was her catty little smile which she usually either reserved for a mean private joke they shared or for when they were about to fall into bed together, even though that happened only occasionally. Either way, this smile could be terrifying if it wasn’t being used as a sexual weapon, and right now, Erik felt his stomach drop at the speed of light.

Their teacher might have begun with the lesson while Erik pretended to listen attentively, Emma flicking listlessly through her notes, but her voice sounded sweet and clear and innocent and so _knowingly_ smug in his mind. _Erik fucking Lehnsherr. You actually_ like _that human geek._

_Emma…_

_Oh, my god! I can’t believe it…!_

_I don’t --!_

_Erik, don’t lie to me. I’m a fucking telepath, in case you’ve forgotten._

_Yeah, that’s why you’re harassing my brain, I suppose?_

_That, as well as -- oh!_ Emma’s voice in his mind went up a notch, a surprised little sound. He shot her a wary side-glance. Her eyes were wide. _Why the crisp clear memory of what four-eyes looks like without his glasses?_

A small, defeated sigh escaped his lips.

_Ugh, Erik. Why?_ Emma’s voice moaned in his head, but alas it wasn’t the happy kind of moan. _Do you need to get laid again? You know I don’t mind --_

“Okay, enough,” he said out loud as he stood up abruptly. Unfortunately, he hadn’t factored in his other twenty-four classmates, plus teacher, who were turning their heads to stare at him in confusion. Meanwhile, Emma grinned wickedly up at him.

“Did you want to share something with the class, Erik?” their teacher asked with a confused little smile. The seconds ticked away, Emma’s taunting voice in his mind parroted, _Yes, Erik, did you want to share something?_ and Erik experienced for the very first time what people liked to refer to as a Brain Fart.

“I -- Well, I’ve had enough of… Of this. Sitting around in class while I need to go to the bathroom.”

“You’re free to go, if Mother nature’s calling,” his teacher replied, frowning slightly, and Erik had never felt so embarrassed in his entire life before, as he stalked out of the classroom, all eyes on him, burning into the back of his neck while Emma continued to laugh cheerfully in his mind.

While this debacle had been bad enough, Erik would only be fooling himself if he believed that it couldn’t get much worse.

Because it did. At lunch.

He and Emma were seated at one table, an icy silence wafting off Erik while Emma deliberately ignored his morose mood and babbled on. She loved, for some perverted reason, annoying the ever living shit out of him, and when he wasn’t in the mood to talk, he usually utterly detested it when someone was chewing his ears off. At least he could send thoughts towards Emma in which he described in precise detail how he’d kill her after school and make sure her body would be hidden away so cunningly that nobody would find her for at least a hundred years.

Once his sandwich was gone, however, there was nothing to stare at in order to avoid Emma’s sweet innocent-looking face. Well, at least until he caught sight from the corner of his eye of a lone figure sitting hunched over a table.

Charles was having lunch alone, Hank and Raven having gone off to God knew where, and he seemed to be staring into empty space while his jaw moved on its own accord, chewing listlessly on lettuce. 

“Don’t you dare..!” came Emma’s warning voice before his next idea was half-formed in his brain. Before he knew what he was doing, he opened his mouth and --

“Charles!”

The boy didn’t hear him at first try. Erik grunted. With a small wave of his finger, the glasses on Charles’s nose began to gently vibrate. His head shot up, instantly taken aback as he yanked off his glasses, and when he noticed that both Erik and Emma were laughing at the look on his face, his cheeks coloured.

“Erik?” His voice wavered a little due to his still incomplete change of voice -- or perhaps just plain fear of Emma -- but he offered a small uncertain smile nonetheless. “Did you do this?” He pointed at his glasses which had stopped moving.

“You didn’t hear me so I had to get your attention _somehow_.”

“Not really,” Emma muttered under her breath beside him but he politely ignored her.

“Do you want to have lunch with us?” he asked instead. It felt weird talking to Charles like this on normal school ground. Hell, even talking to him at all seemed like something that should be physically impossible but here they were. Charles stared at him for one long moment, mouth hanging open. When he finally made up his mind, hesitantly gathering his belongings, Erik didn’t fail to notice that the caféteria had gone quiet around them. People were watching them, some of them were open about it and others pretended to be doing something else while stealing curious glances. Emma had gone very still next to him.

And Erik… He found himself offering a mild smile as Charles approached them. He nearly dropped his school books as he tried to balance his food tray with the other hand while his glasses slipped dangerously close to the tip of his nose. Erik subtly shoved the glasses back up Charles’s nose.

He sat down across from them. Emma looked even more morose than before. Charles fidgeted nervously with his tray while he gave her something that was probably supposed to be a winning smile. For now, it just looked as though he had made a mess in his trousers.

“No need to stare at me like that, specky.” Emma’s cool glare at him was intimidating even to someone like Erik who had known her for several years now.

“Sorry,” Charles apologised meekly and ducked his head. He glanced briefly at Erik before he adjusted his glasses and poked a slice of tomato.

Emma rolled her eyes pointedly at Erik.

“Why were you sitting alone?”

“Oh, you know,” Charles shrugged. “Raven has to write a class test and Hank’s off to a doctor's appointment.”

“Is he sick?”

“Well, after you left, he already looked a bit green-ish around the nose.” The corner of Charles’s mouth quirked up into a crooked smile. “At any rate, he tends to be a bit of a hypochondriac. I’m sure he’ll be back tomorrow.”

“And you don’t mind sitting alone, then?” Erik cast a glance around the room. The other pupils seemed to have moved on and had gone back to chattering.

“It’s what I’m used to. I don’t mind, really. This way I can revise my homework or get some time to read.” He took out the book Erik had given him and waved it in front of his nose before he neatly put it back into his backpack. Erik noticed he had already read one third of it.

_Thank fuck lunch break’s over in ten minutes, otherwise I’d have told you to get a room_ , Emma’s voice huffed in his mind while she herself stared a hole into her plate.

_Don’t be so rude. He’s done nothing to you._

_You mean except for infecting me with his low social skills?_

For that, Erik kicked her under the table. Emma didn’t so much as flinch. Charles cocked his head slightly with his eyebrows raised, silently asking them what was going on.

“I’m fine, sugar. All’s well.” Emma gave him her sweetest yet most disgusting smile.

“Did you -- Did you just read my mind?” Charles looked at her in wonder.

“Either that or you’ve been shouting your thoughts at me. Figure it out yourself.”

“This is… This is _brilliant_! I mean, I know you’re a telepath but I’ve never had one reading my mind.”

“Oh Jesus…”

“Would you mind helping me with an experiment that Hank and I have been working on for a while now? We’re curious about the full extent of different mu--”

“Erik?” She turned her head as she completely ignored Charles’s question. “I’m leaving for our next class. See you later, all right, darling?”

Wordlessly, he accepted her little goodbye kiss and watched her sway out of the room. Charles made a face at her, looking slightly miffed as well as bemused.

“She does it all the time. It’s nothing personal.”

“No offense taken. In fact, I’m glad we get to talk alone for _at least_ another six minutes. That’s more than I could have hoped for.” As one of Erik’s eyebrows shot up at that, Charles quickly corrected himself with a stutter. “I -- I mean, you know. I didn’t think we’d talk at all. Today. Here. In school.” Erik only opened his mouth slightly, Charles continued his babbling. “Since we, uh, we never talk. Here. Except for, you know, two days ago. And yesterday.”

He took a deep breath as he looked at Erik, then to his plate, then back at Erik.

“It’s okay, Charles,” Erik heard himself saying, quiet, while he could tell how the other boy’s body went rigid with suspense at what Erik was going to say. “I don’t mind talking to you. Or spending time with you.”

“Although I’m just an ordinary human?” Charles smiled wryly.

“What do you mean?”

“It’s not as if I didn’t know how all the mutant kids here at school view human beings, Erik. I’m not stupid. I know that _you_ view us boring people as, well --” He gave a little helpless shrug. “As inferior.”

Just as Erik was about to protest at this accusation, Charles gave him a knowing look that shut him up. There were moments when he thought that, perhaps, Charles was a telepath as well. While he wasn’t anything like as annoying as Emma, he, too sometimes seemed as though he could look straight into other people’s brains and know exactly what they were thinking. Or maybe he was just possessed of supreme intuition and a gift for reading body language. And, granted, anybody who knew Erik also knew that he was always ready to fight any opinions which didn’t match with his within the blink of an eye. Either way, it was unnerving.

“If I really thought so little of you, then why would I ask you to come over and sit with me?” He knew he was being a stubborn dick but something in the way Charles’s gaze cut right down to his core had Erik’s hackles rising. Of course he wasn’t going to give him so easily the satisfaction of being right.

“Because you’re not as uncaring as others think you are?” Charles grinned at him. “Speaking of which, thank you once again for the book. It’s fascinating.”

It was just a tiny thing, really, the way Charles smiled at Erik as he thanked him but nonetheless, Erik felt a warm dip in his stomach.

“No problem,” he replied, feeling his cheeks heating up just a bit. For a mere second, an idea crossed his mind which was both absurd and fantastic. “Charles?”

“Hm?”

“I wondered, if --”

The school bell interrupted Erik, and brought him back to his senses. It was a bit like balancing your chair on only one leg until it goes back too far just a notch and realisation hits home, telling you why tipping the chair back was a stupid idea in the first place.

“Never mind,” he said quickly, ignoring the slight disappointment that crossed Charles’s features.

“Well, all right, then. I have to go to my English course now. I suppose I’ll see you tomorrow?”

“It’s Saturday tomorrow, Charles.”

“Oh.” Charles looked truly taken aback. Erik couldn’t help but smile. “Right, sorry. I meant _Monday_.” Erik had to admit, Charles’s embarrassed grin looked good on him. After he had grabbed his backpack, he gave Erik a small awkward wave. Erik watched him scuttle away through the masses of pupils, quick to avoid any potential collisions with people who pretended they didn’t notice him.

But there was at least one person who saw him now.


	4. Chapter 4

There was something distinctly different about the next time Erik saw Charles again. It didn’t happen on Monday, not on Tuesday or Wednesday either. It was in Thursday’s shared Biology course. And Erik _felt_ Charles approach long before he saw him. The metal of Charles’s glasses had become familiar to him but there was something slightly off. Charles was wearing more metal than usual.

As he finally came into the classroom, Erik eyed him with suspicion. The other boy seemed unaware of Erik’s thoughts as he settled down next to him; he looked like he always did, slightly flushed cheeks and glasses askew. But when he smiled at Erik, it was suddenly clear why Erik's senses concerning the metal on Xavier’s body were confused.

Charles was wearing braces.

And, God, were they ugly.

“Hey, Erik,” he said as he sat down next to him, the metal looking brand new and shiny on his teeth. “How was your weekend?”

“Good, good,” he replied. It was difficult not to stare too obviously at the braces but Charles made it extremely difficult for him. “When did you get these?” He pointed at his own teeth, one eyebrow raised.

“Hm? Oh!” Charles gave a little laugh, albeit looking not too happy. “I got them two days ago. I’m telling you, they’re a modern torture device.”

“I’m sorry?”

Charles waved a dismissive hand. “I’ll cope. One and a half years, and it should be over. I hope.”

Erik would have loved to ask him why, for the love of God, it had to be metal but their teacher came into the classroom and the lesson began. Under different circumstances, circumstances during which there wasn’t any additional metal stuck to Charles’s body, Erik wouldn’t have minded _that much_ sitting next to the Boring Xavier Sibling. Now, however, things had changed. Charles might have been the target of unfounded hatred at their school (and Erik began to wonder why people hated Charles to begin with) but now his mere presence was pure agony to Erik. Not because he was afraid of _catching something_ , as Emma had so eloquently put it before, but because...well, he could feel every curious flick of Charles tongue across his new braces. Every suck, every caress. And it didn’t seem as though Charles was going to stop soon. After all, he still had to get used to the foreign object in his mouth -- Erik couldn’t blame him, not really. But he’d be lying if he said it didn’t drive him mad.

The real torture was that they had a double lesson. Two hours of slow teasing which had Erik’s body tingling all over. While it was a slightly numb sensation, diffuse in a way that made it hard to pinpoint where exactly Erik felt it, Erik’s mutation forced him to feel it nonetheless. By the time their lessons were over, his cheeks were flushed and it took all of his willpower to ignore the heat pooling in his stomach. Charles gave him a concerned look while they gathered their belongings.

“Are you okay?” he asked. “You look a bit feverish.”

“I’m fine,” Erik snapped at him, only to soften his words a moment later as he added, “Don’t worry, I’m fine.” And with that, he quickly exited the room before he could give Charles the chance to say more or suck a little longer on the wire attached to his teeth.

*

The rest of his school day went by, thankfully, without any further disruption. Erik was given enough time to calm down his mind as well as his body, and by the time school was over, he felt entirely in control of his body. Emma had shot him curious glances. Erik had grumbled at her to stay out of his brain.

Which she did. Until she saw something which made her call out to him mentally.

_Erik? Where are you?_

_At my locker, why?_

_Come to the entrance._

_I will when I’m done._

_I said come to the entrance because otherwise I will force you like a puppet, Lehnsherr. Move your ass now!_

He was ready to pour his entire repertoire of profanities over Emma the moment he found her but once he finally reached the entrance, he was greeted by the sight of a group of people standing in a circle around something. Or someone.

Emma didn’t look happy in the slightest when he arrived. She was standing near the crowd, looking utterly helpless.

“It’s him, Erik. Some boys dragged him out of the building and started to push him around.”

“Who?”

She rolled her eyes, accompanied by an aggravated sigh. “Charles, you idiot!” She grabbed his shoulders and turned him around. “Can’t you see him?”

And now that she mentioned it…

He couldn’t see Charles per se, but he felt the metal on his body. Erik hated it when Emma was right.

“Look, it’s Jaws from James Bond!” one boy shouted while the others laughed.

The metal on Charles’s body, as far as Erik could tell, was pushed around again, around, around, he felt the metal on Charles’s clothes, his braces, his glasses -- but his glasses --

“Enough!” he shouted as he rushed over to the crowd of bullies, and dragged each one of them away either by hand or with his mutation. Some boys let out a yelp of surprise when he yanked them away by their belts with the invisible magnetic force, others tried to bat his hands away if he grabbed them right at their collars to get them off their victim.

Charles was kneeling on the ground, his clothes rumpled, left cheek slightly red -- Erik had the appalling suspicion that there was going to be a bruise later -- and his hair a mess. He wasn’t looking at Erik but at the thing he was holding in his hands; his ugly wiry aviator glasses were bent to the extreme. It was a miracle that there wasn’t any broken glass involved.

Gently placing a hand upon Charles’s shoulder, Erik knelt down next to him. The other boy flinched at Erik’s touch before he realised who had come to rescue him.

“Charles?”

Only just now, with Charles finally looking up at him, he also saw that his mouth was slightly bruised as well as his nose. Erik swallowed down the urge to jump up and find the person who had done this to him. Instead, he just murmured, “Let’s get you home, okay?”

As Erik helped Charles up, Emma came to help him. She threatened the group of bullies that she’d turn them into drooling meat piles if they so much as tried to get in Erik and Charles’s way -- it seemed to be effective, even though it was a strict school policy that telepaths weren’t allowed to take control over anyone. Erik didn’t need to use his gift again and could manoeuvre Charles away from the school ground towards his home, as it was closer than the Xaviers' mansion.

*

“Meine Güte, Erik, you’re going to hurt the boy even more if you’re not a little more careful!” his mother chided him in her thick German accent while he tried to tend to Charles’s bruises. He _did_ think he was being very careful and gentle as he pressed a cold compress against the other boy’s nose, but Edie Lehnsherr merely clicked her tongue in that niggling annoyed-mother-manner. It was more than obvious that she was doing her utmost to keep herself from swatting her son’s hands away and nursing Charles herself -- after all, this was what she did for a living whereas her son was just a clumsy teenager in her eyes, who had absolutely no idea what he was doing.

Meanwhile, Charles held utterly still, eyes darting in disbelief from Erik to his mother and back again.

“I can’t believe this is happening,” he blurted out eventually while Erik inspected the tiny cuts from the concrete on Charles’s cheek.

“Don’t get used to it, Xavier,” Erik grumbled but a crooked smile took the edge from his words. “I just couldn’t stand there and watch, could I?”

“No,” Charles said, careful. “But you could have joined them, I suppose.”

“Why would I do that?”

Charles shrugged. Erik sighed. Afterwards, he put everything back into his mother’s first aid kit while Charles took out his glasses. A frown was etched on his features while he tried to bend the wire back into its former shape. Erik watched him for a while. His impatience at seeing Charles trying to fix his glasses grew and grew with each huff and grunt of frustration.

“May I?” It wasn’t a question, not really, when he was already in the process of taking the object from Charles’s incapable hands. Charles wanted to protest but then Erik made use of his power and -- 

“That’s _fantastic_!” Rapt filled the other boy’s voice, and smug satisfaction settled in Erik’s chest as he shaped the glasses back into their original form. He did it slowly -- Emma would have called it _putting on a show_ \-- but Charles watched, entranced, and if this was something to put Charles’s mind off the horrible things that had happened to him at school today, Erik was happy to show off his skills. And yes, perhaps he enjoyed impressing the Boring Xavier Sibling, but he’d rather cut his tongue out than admit this. At least Charles wasn’t a telepath and thus stayed blissfully oblivious.

“Try them.” Charles obliged. “Do they fit?”

“Yes, I think so. Just… Maybe a bit too tight at the nose?”

“Hm.” Erik moved his index fingers, just the tiniest of motions, and Charles breathed out a shivery sigh while muttering under his breath, “Marvellous.”

“It’s just a mutation, Charles. Nothing to get your knickers in a twist over. Your sister’s mutation is far more impressive.” Erik still longed to get better acquainted with Raven but that was something he felt Charles didn’t necessarily need to know.

“It is impressive indeed,” Charles agreed. “But then, I think _all_ mutations are remarkable. Whether they’re visible or not, each one of them is unique in its own way.”

“Have you ever been envious of your sister's gift?”

“Raven?” Charles laughed to which Erik hummed in reply. The other boy fell silent for a long moment as he sorted out his thoughts, looking all of a sudden contemplative, sullen even. “I’d be a liar if I said no. It’d certainly make my life easier but…” And now he gave Erik one of his sheepish smiles Erik had grown fond of over such little time. “It’s fine the way it is. Just a few more years of school and then I hope things will get easier. Besides, while I don’t have a mutation myself, I’d like to study them and eventually help young mutants with training their abilities.”

“Although the majority of the bullies at school _are_ mutants?”

“Even then, yes. Maybe I can also teach them not to treat non-gifted humans like rubbish.” The bitterness in Charles’s voice didn’t go unnoticed by Erik and while he would have loved to protest just for the sake of defending his own race, guilt kept him from doing so. Guilt and the fact that he still felt rather protective of this weak human boy who could be so easily, easily broken.

“If you could pick a mutation, though, which one would it be?”

“For myself?”

“No, Charles, for your driver.”

“Dick,” he laughed. “I don’t know, I think… I think I’d like to fly?”

“How creative,” Erik remarked dryly and earned a playful punch on his shoulder.

“Excuse me, but I’d like to go anywhere I like without any physical restrictions. Besides, I like the idea of floating around like a balloon.”

“Anything else?”

“No offense, but I quite dig Emma’s mutation. Telepathy seems pretty cool.”

Erik shuddered visibly at that. “Well, thank fuck you’re a normal, _boring_ human being, then. I can’t even imagine what you’d do with your mutations to other people.”

“Only good things, Erik,” Charles smiled, bruised lips looking impossibly red in contrast to his white teeth. “Only good things.”

*

As Charles finally left his home in the early evening, after hours of their having sat together and actually talked about the things they enjoyed, Erik’s brain formed the half-finished idea of creating a mixtape for the other boy. It was something he usually never did for anyone, perhaps except for his mother, but some small part of him wanted to share something personal with Charles, to assure him that he could count on Erik.

Once the car that had picked up Charles had disappeared from Erik’s sight, he bolted up the stairs into his room, deliberately ignoring his mother’s shouts _not to be so loud_ , and started to jot down a list of his favourite songs.


	5. Chapter 5

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So this is the last chapter of this fic. Thanks so much for the great response to it. :)
> 
> If I've got time and the right inspiration, I may add a tiny sequel to it. WHO KNOWS.
> 
> For now, I hope you'll enjoy reading the update. :)

“You know, I’ve listened to the tape multiple times now, and I’ve got to say it really _is_ amazing.”

“Of course it is. It’s my taste in music that’s amazing.”

“Yes, but maybe also the fact that about sixty percent of the songs are by Queen, and Queen is by default the most amazing band that has ever graced the surface of the planet.”

“Don’t forget the Beatles, Xavier.”

“I’m not!” Erik could hear Charles’s smile at the other end of the line. “I’m talking about _contemporary_ bands. It’s not like they’ll ever go on tour again, right?”

“Such a clever boy you are,” Erik remarked dryly but Charles only laughed. If he listened closely, he could hear his mixtape playing faintly in the background. “What’s currently on?”

“Hm? Oh!” Charles fell momentarily quiet until he started to sing along under his breath “ _The walls start shaking, the earth was quaking. My mind was aching_... AC/DC. That’s a bit older, isn’t it?”

Erik hummed in reply. “Still good, though.”

“Yeah.” A clicking sound, and then the music had stopped playing. “If you ever make one of these again, feel free to make a copy for me as well.”

“How about _you_ make one for me?”

“Me?” Charles sputtered. “My taste in music is, uh, probably not as good as yours.”

“I don’t believe you.”

“No, really.” Charles half-laughed, half-sighed, resigned. “I mean, unless you like Mozart and other dead old blokes who’ve been decomposing for hundreds of years. Raven always says I’m like a little old man, and she always gives me weird looks when I listen to something _modern_ when she’s around. As if she cannot believe I’d actually know a bloody thing about pop culture.”

“Well, my mother’s discovered some German spoken-word artist who’s recorded a song about Mozart this year. People in Europe apparently go crazy over it.”

“See? I’m not that out of touch, then.”

Suddenly, Erik heard someone yelling in the background, presumably Raven: “Charles, don’t block the fucking phone line! You two lovebirds can be cute somewhere else but I’m waiting for a call from Hank!”

“He’s not --! We’re --!” Charles protested but Raven just laughed loudly until her voice had vanished.

“Has she run off?”

“Yes,” Charles muttered. Erik could picture his frown too well.

“What a brat. I like her.”

Charles groaned. “Please don’t team up with her. She feeds off my misery. She’s getting _stronger_ thanks to it, Erik. Like a wendigo or something.”

“All the more reason to get better acquainted with her.”

“ _Anyway_ ,” Charles sighed deeply and Erik bit back a grin at the obvious lack of subtlety when it came to changing topics, “I have to go now before little Miss Impatient throws a tantrum.”

“You’ve just run out of poor excuses _not_ to make a tape for me, Charles. It’s okay, just admit it.”

“No, I haven’t!” the other boy laughed, bright and earnest. “Tell you what. I’ll make one for you, and if you like, I’ll come over and we listen to it together. How does that sound?”

“ _Charles and Erik sitting in a tree_ \--”

“Oh for God’s sake! Fuck off, Raven!”

Erik nearly dropped the phone from laughing too hard at Charles’s indignant response to Raven’s teasing sing song. They said a hasty goodbye, during which Charles promised Erik he’d work on a thoughtful mixtape just for him before Raven suddenly seemed to have grabbed the phone with a quick “Hi, Erik! Bye, Erik!” shouted down the line -- Charles yelled something unintelligible in the background -- and then there was just the perpetual _beep beep beep_ of a dead line. And yet, Erik found himself still grinning at the phone in his hands.

He wasn’t quite sure when exactly it happened, but over the shortest amount of time, he and Charles had grown inexplicably comfortable with each other. Of course the main reason for all this was the mixtape he had given Charles after the incident at their school. The tape had done its duty as a cheer-the-fuck-up gift; Charles had beamed at him, albeit shyly, and ever since, they had spent more and more time together. Along with their new friendship, it wasn’t easy to ignore Charles’s new shiny metallic braces, especially not when Charles was lost in thought as he tended to suck at the gaps between each brace and wriggle his tongue in and around them. But Erik managed. Somehow.

As time passed, he found himself giving fewer and fewer fucks about what other people at school thought about their unusual and unexpected friendship. So what? Maybe he took a bit of pleasure in playing Charles’s guard dog to keep off the bullies because he enjoyed seeing their ridiculous intimidated faces as soon as they noticed the metal on and in their bodies vibrating dangerously.

It was also rewarding to see that, despite Charles’s habitual expression, which seemed quite stern and decidedly disapproving at first, there was always an underlying, subtle little smile, reserved just for Erik.

Emma wasn’t amused at all by their new budding friendship but Erik had a feeling that she was mostly just acting out because that was what people expected of her. Her smiles for Charles grew more and more genuine, and her insults lost some of their bite. And as for the other school bullies...surprisingly, things seemed to calm down. They quietly accepted that Erik was from now on, through unspoken agreement, Charles’s bodyguard, albeit foremost his friend. Neither did it seem as if they hunted Charles down when Erik's back was turned. 

Things started to get better at last. Charles seemed happier. A lot, in fact, so much that he started to come out of his shell and open up to other people. He had never been really shy in the first place, Erik knew as much, but bad experiences at school had always inhibited his desire to approach others first.

It had taken him nearly an entire month to create the perfect mixtape for Erik, as promised. Erik knew that Charles was being careful, that he didn’t want to mess it up; he wanted to show Erik that he was, in fact, _cool_. And yet, Erik didn’t need further convincing to believe that; Charles had proven himself to be one of the goddamn nicest people he had ever met. Which was saying a lot, considering that Erik usually despised ordinary human beings who weren’t his non-mutant mother.

When Charles finally showed up at his door unexpectedly one sunny day, waving the finished mixtape in front of Erik’s face, Erik didn’t know yet that things were going to change. Drastically. At that moment, he was just pleasantly surprised to find his new friend at his house.

“I thought you were on holiday?” he asked as he stepped aside to let Charles in. Summer vacation had started just two weeks ago. For some reason Erik had assumed that Charles would be away and thus hadn’t bothered to contact him ever since school let out.

“Raven is, yes. With mother.”

“And you?”

“I can think of far more pleasant things than going on holiday with her. Like shoving bamboo sticks underneath my fingernails.” Charles grimaced. “And before you ask, Raven still wanted to go even though I offered to help her fake her death in order to escape mother.”

“The promise of a holiday was enough, hmm?”

“Apparently, so. I think they’re somewhere in Thailand right now.”

Erik hummed in reply. Charles’s wealth never failed to baffle him since the boy himself never seemed as though he was a socialite. Currently, he wore a worn-out out pair of Converse shoes, old jeans and a plain t-shirt which once upon a long ago was probably blue. It was easy to forget that underneath the unkempt hair and rumpled clothes, Charles came from old money. Right now, however, he was happy enough to sit in the Lehnsherrs' tiny kitchen with the radio on and drink tap water. He especially seemed to like the half-dry cake his mother had brought from work as a treat for Erik.

 _It was someone’s birthday at work, and I thought before we throw away the rest of it, you’d like it,_ she had said to him the evening before. Erik was glad he hadn’t inhaled it the moment Edie had given it to him -- otherwise he wouldn’t have been able to witness Charles making nearly obscene noises as he took his first bite. As much as Erik was tempted to take the piss out of his friend for the weird noises he was making, it was strangely mesmerising to hear him making such sounds. It was during these moments that Erik involuntarily lowered his defences and felt each stroke and suck of Charles’s tongue against his metal braces, as well as the cutlery in his mouth. Erik sighed.

“So, the mixtape,” he offered with a nod at the item which lay on the table next to Charles’s dish.

“Do you want to listen to it?” Charles asked timidly, then stuffed another forkful of cake into his stupid mouth.

“That’s why you’re here after all,” Erik retorted in a slightly strained voice. The more Charles ate, the more difficult it was for him to concentrate on anything else but the metal in his mouth. It was pure torture.

“Oh?” Charles raised his eyebrows. “Are you going to throw me out again once I’ve given it to you?”

“That was the plan.”

“What a lousy friend you are, Erik,” Charles clicked his tongue disapprovingly. Quickly, he finished his cake before he grabbed the tape and stood up. “Are you coming or not?”

“Stop nagging. You’re worse than my mother,” Erik muttered as he got up to clean the table.

“True. I don’t randomly give you cake. I come here to _eat_ it.”

Charles ducked his head laughing just in time before Erik could throw a damp towel right into his face.

*

“To be honest, I thought your taste in music was much more disastrous,” Erik said while he changed the tape to the second side. He and Charles had been lying on the floor in his room for the past 45 minutes, listening to the masterpiece that was the mixtape personally made for Erik. Comics and books and vinyls lay strewn across the floor, and while Erik was content enough to just listen to the music Charles had recorded for him, the other boy was looking through Erik’s belongings and flicking through some of his old comics, oblivious to Erik’s eyes watching him with amusement.

“Maybe the second side will finally give you a heart attack,” Charles replied with an ominous eyebrow wiggle.

“Let’s find out.”

With a click, the player came back to life and a soft melody filled the silence in the room. Despite Charles’s warnings, the tape didn’t contain any sort of classical music but rather rock and pop music from ten, twenty and even thirty years ago. It was a potpourri of melodies; Erik found himself liking almost every song on it.

“I hope you don’t mind all the sixties and seventies music on this side.” The sudden sound of Charles’s voice was startling amidst the hypnotic noise that was psychedelic rock made by Pink Floyd.

“No, no. Not at all,” Erik sighed, feeling strangely relaxed. He could have sworn that never in his life before had the carpet in his room felt so soft as it did in this very moment. Perhaps that was also partly due to Charles, sprawled out now next to Erik, his voice barely above a whisper as he hummed along to the song. It was...cosy. To say the least. The temperature was for once actually nice -- despite the warm summer, the air didn’t feel too humid and sticky, and Erik couldn’t think of anywhere he’d rather be than here right now, with Charles and their slightly dusty but nonetheless magnificent music.

The song changed, Charles turned to lie on his side, facing Erik, and somehow, everything shifted within a split second. While John Lennon crooned into the microphone about how bad he wanted Yoko Ono, Erik turned his head slightly to get a better view of the other boy. The silence between them was unusual -- normally, Charles would babble about whatever came into his mind just to avoid any awkward silences, but this… This wasn’t awkward. They looked at each other. They smiled lazily. Erik’s gaze wandered over Charles’s features, taking him in. Faintly, he could also feel the metal in the braces, warm and wet in Charles's mouth. For once, Charles wasn’t toying with the wire.

And then, just because it felt right somehow, Erik leaned in, close, closer, nudged their noses together. Dimly, he registered at the back of his mind how Charles’s face coloured although his stupid red lips formed a nervous little smile. Some synapses in Charles’s brain must have snapped because the next moment, Erik found the other’s lips pressed against his, clumsy yet soft and --

_Oh Christ, what am I doing? He’s going to kill me, he’s going to strangle me and dispose of my dead useless body somewhere in the woods. I fucked up, I --_

“What the fuck?” Erik exclaimed as he jerked away from the kiss, staring at Charles with wide eyes. Charles looked as though he had been smacked.

“I-I’m sorry, I really _am_ sorry, Erik, I didn’t want to do this, I don’t know why I did it--”

“Shut the fuck up, Charles. The kiss was fine.”

Charles blinked, slow. “It was?”

“Yeah. You know I don’t really care about whether you’re gay or not or whatever. I’m talking about _this_!” He wasn’t being overly gentle as he tapped his fingertip against Charles’s forehead to make clear what he was talking about. “I could hear your thoughts!”

“That’s…” Charles made a disbelieving noise. “That’s nonsense. That’s ridiculous. I’m not a telepath, Erik.”

“Well then, how do you explain that I know you were just panicking about me strangling you?”

“If, _if_ I’m a telepath, then why can’t I hear you?” Charles looked momentarily triumphant while he completely ignored what Erik had just said. “Because I dare say it’s rather quiet around here.”

“That,” Erik began and took Charles’s hand in his, “is because I’m used to blocking Emma out of my mind. I don’t like it when she snoops around in my head or randomly tells me about how her day went. I need my privacy.”

“Are you _always_ blocking her out?”

“Yeah, you wouldn’t believe how much of a pain in the ass she can be when she’s bored. And her range lets her reach half across the town if she wants to nag about something. It's annoying.” And then he added with a little grin, “Except for when we’re in school. That’s when her telepathy comes in handy.”

“One could say that’s tele _pathetic_ , Erik.”

_Shut up, Xavier._

Charles’s eyes went wide when it sank in that Erik wasn’t talking to him out loud, but thinking rather loudly. Erik felt pleased.

“See? You’re a mutant, too.”

Just when he had got used to the idea that his friend -- his friend for whom he had more than friendly feelings, his friend he didn’t mind snogging -- was an ordinary human, he now had to adjust to the fact that two of his friends -- his only friends, really -- were telepaths. He wasn’t quite sure whether or not he liked it. Looking at Charles, however, and holding his hand was enough to make him forget about his dislike and worry concerning mind readers. They were creepy to him still, but at least the one he liked best was sweet.

“I’m a late bloomer, it seems,” Charles joked. He would have seemed surprisingly calm about this, if it hadn’t been for the way he tightened his hold on Erik’s hand. There was also an underlying sense of anxiety wafting off Charles in waves like Erik had never experienced before. Emma was always calm and collected around him. Perhaps it had been just like this for her when she first noticed her power.

 _Better late than never_ was just at the tip of the tongue but he managed to restrain himself from blurting out his first thought. He honestly hoped that Charles didn’t hear it in fear of hurting him unintentionally. Instead, he just said, “You're lucky it happened now; you can still seek training at school. Also, you’ve got me, right? I can help you, and if I’m persuasive enough, I can perhaps even drag Emma into this...”

“Oh, Erik,” Charles laughed with a small sigh, giving his hand a light squeeze. “I appreciate what you want to do for me, but… Don’t you think there’s other stuff we need to talk about first?”

“What?”

“Well.” Charles lifted up their joined hands, giving Erik an expectant look. Erik suddenly felt rather sheepish.

“Oh.”

“Yeah.”

“Well?”

“As you may have figured out by now, I like you.”

“I like you, too.”

“Yeah?”

“Yeah.”

“Oh.”

“Oh? Is that good?”

“Very good. And for you?”

“Charles.”

“What?”

“Shut up.”

And just like that, Erik silenced Charles’s worries with another simple yet heartfelt kiss -- never mind that it slightly fogged up Charles’s glasses.


End file.
